exam 2

Anthropology 104 with Wendland at University of Wisconsin - Madison

About this deck

By: Kristin Franco
Textbook:

In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio (Structural Analysis in the Social Sciences)

Nest in the Wind: Adventures in Anthropology on a Tropical Island, Second Edition

Social and Cultural Anthropology: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)

Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande
Created: 2008-12-14
Size: 83 flashcards
Views: 65

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holistic

sees religion as entiwined with other spheres of social + cultural life

universalistic

studies all societies not just western or literate ones

comparative

develops an analytic language across specific contexts

contextual

seeks to interpret facts in terms of contexts that produce them

religion has two poles which are?

mystical and ideological

mystical pole is...

religion points inward to experience, deep emotion, transformed consciousness: but the particulars of these experiences are always culturally shaped

ideological

? religion points outward to social roles, hierarchies, power, divisions and distinctions

folk narrative

dif than personal stories.
-collectively made (tales, legends, myths)
-symbols which may be multivocal
-have recurring themes, ej food,

narratives about deities and gurus

swamiji- people choose the form their faith resonates best with
ej mother goddesses as fiercely protective,

ecological anthropology

how do people sustain themselves in dif enviros, why do they choose to do it that way?
what do dif subsistence strategies have to do with the forms culture takes/how it changes?

historical approaches...

environmental determinism, possibilism, cultural ecology, ecological functionalism

environmental determinism

environment determines human behavior and society. really ethnocentric, tropical people lazy... ignores historical evidence...nor explains cultural diversity

possibilism

environments do not determine society, but set the limits of possibility (but just cause its possible, doesnt mean people do it)

cultural ecology

cultures interact with the environment through a process of adaptation related to changing technology and arrangements of production... but Julian Steward never considered negative cultural traits

ecological functionalism

culture is a set of feedback systems keeping everything ? like population and resources ? in homeostasis (pigs for the ancestors)

all the environment theories either 1 didnt account for externam forces, cultural variation, or they were ethnocentric. so how do we study it?

combination of approaches, people recognize that its a holistic thing, moving back and forth between idiographic and nomothetic approaches

subsistence strategy- foraging

gathering wild foods and hunting game (example: Ju/hoansi people of Namibia), no farming

subsistence strategy- horticulture

farming domesticated plants with simple technology; includes swidden (?slash and burn?) gardening (extended example from Kent?s fieldwork among the Caboclo [mixed-heritage peasant] people who live along the Rio Negro in the Brazilian Amazon basin)

subsistence strategy- pastoralism

primary subsistence relies on one or more domesticated animals (example: Chukchi reindeer herders, Siberia)

subsistence strategy- intensive agriculture

farming using various complex technologies like plows and irrigation; surplus allows other non-subsistence jobs (example: rice farming in Bali) 10,000 yrs old

subsistence strategy- industrialized food production

mechanized agriculture relying on machine and chemical inputs; minority of population engaged in subsistence (example: US)

examples of why studying religion is hard

durkheim's distinction between "sacred" and "profane" doesnt work in most societies. separating religion from other parts of culture is impos.

economy stuff

people dont use all the resouces that are available to them. every economy involves prodction and consumption of goods that are necessary or desirable.

three factors of production in capitalist economies

labor, land, capital

labor

any work that is paid for. maintenance can have implications for status of men vs women

land

a site for living and working, a source of resources

capital

the money or property used to carry on a business- typically refers to general purpose money

3 good things with money

-allows evaluation of many dif kinds of goods and services on a common scale
-serves as a means of exchange, sell what you have buy what you want, not just bartering
-functions as a means of repayment, no matter how debt is obtained

modes of allocation- householding

when members of a household produce their own subsistence, with minimal dependence on trade for food or other necessities
ej- agricultural pioneers in wisconsin produced their own shelter food and fuel. used more here when market seems less reliable.

modes of allocation- reciprocity

exchange of goods among people already associated with one another (usually by kinship or place of residence). gift giving also for example cements family ties.

modes of allocation-resistribution

systematic movement of goods or wealth toward an administrative center and its reallocation by authorities. communists. modern tax institutions.

modes of allocation-market

exchange of goods at prices (in money or in other goods) determined by laws of supply and demand. exchange not restricted by family ties. good example is of nonmarket economies is kula from trobriaand islands yams and fish

faulty assumptions (old) on gender

world of women is familiar and domestic, world of men is public and political. contrary ej is thai women.

matrilineality does....

allows women to mobilize along kinship lines, puts men under pressure,

typical features of a society

group united by principles, recognizes self as group, territorially localized, bonded by common linguistic/symbolic representations, most interactions are in the group, primary recruitment is by procreation

every group claims superiority over others... why does rank matter..

unequal distribution of the four "P"s, power prestige, property, pleasure,

major kinds of ranking systems can include...

gender, caste, race, class, ethnicity

key features of caste ideal

ideal, fixed social order.
combines endogamy, occupational specialization, ritual purity,
reinforced by rules of daily living
determined by lineage, allows little social mobility

key features of social class ideal

capitalists controlled means of production, labored wage, material possessions, income, education, high social mobility same opps for everyone

two largest forms of marginalization

racism, sexism

culture is?

multifaceted symbolic webs which we decide to control us, we are slaves to culture, make our webs but are constrained by them

problems with medical categories... two good ways possibly to do categories?

overlap between traditional vs biomedical. its ethnocentric. biomedical is empirical, some standard contron NOT!, "traditional" is way too big, no philosophical coherence. other good categories would be mystical rational causation natural, internal external

authority

ancestry, holiness, military sucess, demonstrated moral worth. Mendela!

power

getting other people to do what you want. Ugabe!

status

publicly recognized social positions, ej mother king nephew middle class.
obvi individuals occupy many statuses at once. can be ascribed or achieved. role is customary for occupants of the status. castes and social classes are statuses, so is race.

race

folk taxonomy, not a biologically meaningful categorization. how do we know? genetically more variation within groups than between them. phenotypic variations that we consider important do not vary together. racial categories have changed faster than biology has.

factors that constrain deviance in society

guilt, shame, avoidance, supernatural sanction

guilt

internalized version of society's external rules

shame

fear of disapproval, gossip and ridicule.

avoidance

deviant person loses social and economic ties

supernatural sanction

ej witchcraft beliefs, santa claus, wrath of god.

arbitration and remediation

ej inuit song contest

law

codified rules of behavior, enforced by duly constituted authority

government, what is it what does it do

?institutionalized power / authority
?key functions conflict management, inter-group relations (diplomacy / warfare)
may take many forms from the simple (headman) to the complex (state bureaucracy)

authority

ability to influence based on personal status or status of office

power

ability to influence based on threat of force or sanction

state

role: structure bueracracy with monopoly on legitimate use of violence. geographic territory. cultural invention.

nation

either civic or ethnic, group with sense of shared culture, history and destiny.

nation-state

civic (ej US) or ethnic nation with its own state leadership... national sovereignty.

ethnic groups / ethnic nation

claim common biological descent and/or shared historical experience, perceive selves as different than other groups, ej navajo nation 1/4 your heritage

Antonio Gramsci's three means of maintaining rule

domination, ideology, hegemony

domination

rule by coercive power (example: Robert Mugabe), rulers are vulnerable unless convince. they use schools and gifts..

ideology

openly perpetuated beliefs justifying political arrangements (example: the Pledge of Allegiance) openly advocating itself

hegemony

perpetuation of the world view of the dominant as ?common-sense? modes of speech or behavior or values or ideas, accepted by rulers and ruled (example: the American dream)

name one (of three) defining characteristic of general purpose money

1 means/system of exchange 2 system of repayment 3 system of evaluation

ethnography says in a village they are clan exogamous and tribe endogamous. what does this mean?

outside clan, inside tribe

compare caste in india and social class in america 2 differences 2 similarities

both systems of rank, born into both, caste totally dependent on lineage, class has to do with stuff and material goods wealth... both may have some cultural performance relations...

why does culture change

-because it is a product of human creativity.
also, ? our culture is not genetically determined, we use both tools and meanings to construct culture ? not only do we apply them both to our environments, we may reshape the tools and meanings themselves

how does culture change usually begin?

often starts with someone questioning the standard blueprint (example: changing social role performance)
OR re-contexting: moving an idea or practice from one context to another where it is completely new

the fallacy of cultural determinism

? cultures are neatly bounded
? cultures are monolithic
humans are passively molded by culture

culture change is really rapid in response to... plus examples!

? changing technologies (example: flutes and boomboxes among the Wai Wai; cell phones in the Third World)
? changing ecological circumstances (example: sex 1950s-2000s in America)
? changing political and economic circumstances (example: Spanish colonialism and the Yaqui people of what is now Mexico) ? colonialism, development and globalization

when imposed change is unwelcome or catastrophic (2)

1 cultural dissonance is common (the culture in people?s heads does not match the world outside them and so behavior does not produce desired ends)

2millenarian cults are likely ? typically promise utopia on earth often after dramatic purge of existing social order (example: Melanesian cargo cults)

what is prestige

accumulating, giving away, destroying

what did bourgois hate about culture of poverty cycle?

doesnt take into account external forces, can be a "blame the victim" approach

your "choice"

is significantly constrained and altered by structural problems!!

structural inequality

inequality related to institutinos, laws, customs, relations between governments and other social structures

effects of cash taxation

increase famine, increase STDs, transition to cash economy, women economically marginalized

neoliberal economic policies

caused user fees for health and education, currency devaluation, elimination/weakening of minimum wages, price controls, labor protections

primary purpose of anthropology can be seen as developing a ?binocular vision"

? see a culture from the perspective of those who are in it
? and simultaneously from an outside view
? look at the historical, political, economic, and social environment
? compare with other cultures
=if we can learn to achieve this binocular vision, we can apply it to our own culture too

why we encounter the other

? as a way to glorify ourselves
? as a way to criticize ourselves (example: Sweet 16 Birthday Party: Exiled!)
by accident

ways to consider human diversity

? as something to be feared
? as something to be controlled by bureaucratic approaches to ?tolerance?
? as aesthetic pleasure
? as evolutionary resource
? as a way to ?increase the number of stories in the world? (attributed to Geertz)

purpose of stories / narratives

? make sense of past and explain how we got to present
? project us into the future
? give us opportunity to understand our choices as leading to different possible outcomes
? what does it mean to hold something (like the American Dream) as a story instead of as a belief?
? what does it mean to move beyond the stories told us by advertisers?